The Register recently ran a story on HABLA, the Home-based Activities Building Language Acquisition program, which aims to help teach toddlers from low-income, Spanish-speaking families English and Spanish by sending language coaches into their homes. HABLA is based on the premise that the more children communicate at a young age, the more quickly they develop language skills.

While the program remains controversial because of its bilingual approach, recent studies by the Brookings Institution suggest that improving toddlers’ native linguistic skills helps them more easily learn English. Regardless of the arguments for or against HABLA, its premise – that children best learn languages when they are young and that frequent communication is necessary for language acquisition – should be considered in constructing foreign-language education in America.

Most public school students do not begin studying foreign languages until high school, and then it is usually to fulfill a graduation requirement. After all, it is difficult to see any reason to study a foreign language since much of the rest of the world is becoming fluent in English. Most European countries now mandate English education in primary or lower secondary education, and many mandate the study of two foreign languages at the upper secondary level. About 93 percent of students in the European Union study English in lower secondary education.

Hence, foreign students come to American colleges and universities fluent in English while many Americans bumble about foreign countries with a superficial level of language, able to ask, “Where is the bathroom?” or “I’ll have a beer.” Most of us are never really able to communicate at a deeper level or engage in a conversation without asking someone to pause or repeat themselves several times.

At my college, I am always surprised and impressed when I meet students from foreign countries like Singapore or Romania who speak English just as fluently and can discuss topics like philosophy and politics just as well as American students. They are surprised that I am surprised: When they learn English from the age of 6, shouldn’t they be fluent by age 18? Besides, since they are inundated by American culture – pop songs, movies and such – they quickly pick up American slang and colloquialisms.

While most American students at some point study a foreign language, very few learn one. This, of course, fits in with the American education system, which promotes the study of many disciplines, but the learning of very few. Most students give up on a second language in high school because it is too difficult or time-consuming. They don’t see the long-term benefits, and foreign-language teachers often don’t do a good job of explaining them. Only in higher education do many students’ eyes open to how limited their communication skills are. Globalization sets in.

But by then, it is often too late. Some of my friends are now taking classes in Chinese, Japanese and Arabic because they realize the potential benefits in today’s globalized market. To compete for some jobs, they must be fluent in languages other than English.

Many of them complain about the difficultly of learning a second language at an older age and wish that they had learned when they were younger. Regardless of the brain’s increased capacity for knowledge, it simply is more difficult to learn a second language at an older age. As we grow older, we experience more anxieties, inhibitions and time constraints.

Returning to the HABLA program, American education should strive to offer and encourage bilingualism – not just for low-income Spanish-speaking students trying to assimilate and learn English. In primary schools, foreign languages should be offered and taught alongside English – not mandated but optional for parents who want to give their child a leg up. Students not only should be exposed to foreign languages, but they should also be provided with more opportunities to communicate using them.

The primary impediment, however, to teaching children foreign languages at a younger age is the lack of credentialed teachers fluent in foreign languages. This is, after all, one of the primary reasons that private schools are usually able to offer better and more diverse foreign-language programs than public schools.

We need to open up the education system to noncredentialed teachers and community volunteers, those like the HABLA coaches, who are fluent in foreign languages. The teachers’ union stranglehold on the education system is preventing students from obtaining a more diverse, multicultural education.

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